Page 53 of You Belong to Me
But she hadn’t. She should have, but she hadn’t. And when he’d curled his body to hers, the desire had built inside her, had nearly taken over twice, and now was beyond her control. And he hadn’t let her run from it. Had he known what she was feeling, what he’d made her feel?
He held her cheeks with both hands while he kissed her. He was gentle. He was thorough. He was at his persuasive best. And he was driving her mad with…
“Your body is driving me mad, sweetheart. I’m sorry, but I can’t lie here beside you andnotmake love to you.”
Had she said that? No, he had. And for once his “sweetheart” hadn’t sounded mocking; it had sounded like the endearment it was supposed to be. But he wasn’t giving her a chance to answer him. He was kissing her again, more deeply now, and she was drowning in sensations, the heat, the churning—him. She was drowning in him, with him.
“Yes,” she gasped out when she could.
“What?”
“Yes, now.”
“Oh, God, thank you,” he whispered, covering her face with kisses, not missing an inch of it.
She smiled, not sure what God had to do with it. He didn’t notice, moving on to her neck, her shoulders, leaving a moist, hot trail that caused shiver after shiver to pass down her arms, down her spine, down her legs.
The covers were gone. He was her cover now, and she didn’t feel the cold at all. On the contrary, she was so hot, a dousing in the snow would have been welcome. Vasili was more welcome, though, when he moved farther over her and settled between her legs, not his hips but his waist, because he’d moved down as his mouth had, following the deep scoop of her camisole, his teeth pulling at the strings that laced it together, opening it inch by agonizing inch.
Her own hands were not idle, were learning the texture and hardness of his skin, the broadness of his shoulders, the thickness of his neck, the unruly hair that was so soft running through her fingers.
“Oh, Jesus, thank you. They’re more perfect than I imagined,” he said reverently.
He had revealed her breasts completely, was staring at them in something akin to awe, and she was finally embarrassed, because she considered them her worst feature. They were too large, frequently having to be bound when she worked and exercised her horses, certainly more trouble than they were worth.
Yet Vasili didn’t seem to think so, and she stared at him oddly as he buried his face between them, turning slowly from side to side to share his lips with each. And then his words penetrated. He didn’t find her breasts unusual, he found them beautiful, and he proved that over and over again in the minutes that followed. He held them, he caressed and suckled on them, he wouldn’t leave them alone. And what that sensual onslaught did to Alexandra, coupled with his hard belly pressed to the center of her loins, was to take her so near the precipice, the tiniest push would have sent her over.
Vasili was aware of that. He knew the female body as well as his own, knew all the pleasure points and how to maximize a woman’s enjoyment. And he knew that Alexandra had gone beyond that. Her breathing told him, her fingers digging into his scalp, the arching, the thrusting, her legs squeezing against his waist with more strength than he’d ever felt before. Much as he would have loved to continue his exploration of her body, he wanted even more to feel her climax surrounding him. And if he didn’t enter her now, she’d have it without him.
His lips returned to hers to try to calm her with light nibbles while he removed the rest of her underwear, but she was beyond calming. And she was as demanding and passionate in lovemaking as she was in everything else, pulling him to her as soon as she wasbare, her hands gripping his buttocks, pressing him forward.
It was mere luck that he was positioned accurately, because she wasn’t waiting, was already thrusting upward, and he slid home, into so much moist heat, such incredible tightness, and an unexpected barrier that he broke through before there was even time for him to realize what it was.
There was a barely perceptible stiffening of her body that didn’t last, a gasp that she cut off. He leaned upward, disbelieving, but whatever he would have said was forgotten as he watched the pleasure suddenly wash over her, felt the pulsebeat surround him and draw him deeper into her, and in the next heartbeat, incredibly, he soared over the edge himself, caught in the most powerful climax of his experience.
25
It didn’t take long for them to feel the chill in the room again once their bodies cooled. Vasili was the first to retrieve the blankets that had been kicked aside. Alexandra said nothing when he covered her.
She was in a state of shock over what she’d done, and it got worse when she realized that not once had she thought of Christopher tonight. Not once had she considered that she was being unfaithful to him. Those damn feelings had just taken over, leaving her uncaring of anything except gratifying them.
She’d never known that passions could be so powerful and all-consuming. She wished she’d never found out. She wished also that she could blame Vasili in some way, but she couldn’t. Seducing women was what he did. As far as she could tell, it was his only occupation. She’d known that. And as for his being irresistible, that was God’s gift, not something he’d arranged for personally.
The blame was hers and hers alone. She’d known exactly what he was doing, fought itas long as she could, then given up and enjoyed it. And the enjoyment—she wasn’t going to think about that. Pleasant feelings had no place beside her present self-loathing. But, oh, God, it had been nice, better than nice, too nice.
For a first experience of such things, Alexandra had to allow she’d had the best, certainly more than she could ever have imagined. But she wished that were otherwise, too. At least she’d be feeling better right now if it hadn’t been so damned wonderful.
Vasili couldn’t stop thinking about it, and no wonder, since he’d never experienced anything like it before. If he hadn’t broken all records on the speed of his first climax, there was no comparison on the second one. But that first time, to come after only one thrust, when had that ever happened to him before? For that matter, when had it ever been that powerful before?
But what he still found unbelievable was that it hadn’t ended there. While he had lain on top of her, trying to recover, trying to figure out what had just happened, it had happened again, without any effort on his part, without warning, merely because he’d still been buried in that tight, hot sheath. No, not merely. That in itself was too ordinary to have anything to do with it. It had to be that virgin barrier that he’d found so stimulating, the one thing in his vast sexual experience that he’d always denied himself.
And that was another thing. How could henot have known? Virgins were too easy to spot. They had qualities that were uniquely their own. Alexandra was too bold, too frank, too passionate in her emotions, and there was nothing even remotely virginal in the way she kissed. The typical signs hadn’t been there and he felt—deceived, tricked, and about as gullible as a sixteen-year-old.
But at the same time, there was another feeling that was too primitive even to examine, and certainly made no sense. As if it would matter to him that no man had ever been there before him. Thatnevermattered to him, only the pleasure mattered.
With such turbulent thoughts on both sides of the bed, the tension in the room was building fast. Vasili felt the need to complain about the gift he’d been given, a gift he would have refused had he been offered a chance to—at least he wanted to think he would have refused it. And Alexandra knew she’d never be able to sleep until she assured Vasili that their making love changed nothing between them—at least she wanted tothinkit didn’t.
For her, the easiest way was to tell him. “What I said once about this sealing your fate—forget I said it.”
